Research from Delaware State University and Arizona State University indicates a new-fangled way of computer security from Microsoft may a good target for hackers.

Information Week reported the paper from researchers at the two universities indicated that the “gesture-based passwords” in Windows 8 can be compromised fairly easily.

The method has users tracing a pattern on a familiar photograph, rather than typing a password.

According to the story , Hongxin Hu from Delaware State and the ASU researchers found a way to crack the gesture passwords. They also see potential for hackers to do damage, with automated programs that do not have any information about the user of the passwords.